On Friday night, the Rolling Stones opened their 2013 "50 and Counting" world tour at the Staples Center with a rip-roaring, age-defying concert. So rip-roaring and age-defying, in fact, that it may still be reverberating through the vast, now-empty arena.

One block away on Friday, the summer blockbuster movie "Iron Man 3" opened at Regal Cinemas L.A. Live 14 (and at theaters nationwide, including in San Diego). Yet, while the film's star, Robert Downey, Jr., may act like a superhero on the big screen, the real deal was singing and dancing up a storm on the Staples stage.

True, Mick Jagger didn't fly through the air or dispatch any enemies with earth-shuddering explosions. But, at 69, the Stones' wildly charismatic front man isn't so much a force of nature as a he is a musical whirlwind who almost seems to defy nature altogether. As slim and wiry as a hyperactive teenager, he was constantly gyrating, dancing and bounding across both the stage and the massive catwalk that looped around the front part of the venue.

More impressive still, Jagger sang with increasing strength and conviction during the 23-song, two-hour and 19-minute concert. It opened with a super-charged "Get Off of My Cloud" and concluded with a third and final encore of "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction," which was delivered with enough fervor and intensity to make time stand still, at least for a moment. Jagger also easily out-sang Friday's two much younger guests.

Sporting a long blond wig, No Doubt's Gwen Stefani traded vocals with him on the country-tinged love ballad "Wild Horses." She had a giddy, "I can't believe this is really happening!"expression, but sang in a lower key than she seemed comfortable with. Country-rock star Keith Urban fared better on guitar than when he went head to head on vocals with Sir Mick on the 1978 rave-up "Respectable."

Of course, with Jagger and guitarist Keith Richards both set to turn 70 this year — and drummer Charlie Watts now nearly 72 — the inexorable march of time is undeniable. Guitarist Ronnie Wood, who turns 66 in June and was in excellent form throughout Friday's concert, is the baby of the band. The combined ages of the four Stones is 274, at least until next month, and the median age of the group's members is older than that of the current U.S. Supreme Court justices.

Richards, for the first time ever on a Stones' tour, did not dye his now all-white hair dark, although he certainly was aware that what was once the world's greatest rock band may now also be the oldest.

"It's great to be here," Richards told the audience. "It's great to be anywhere, let's face it!"

It was the kind of line comedians like Rodney Dangerfield or Henny Youngman might have once used (and probably did). That would have been back in an era when the young, rebellious Stones were regarded as a palpable threat to society and were often the butt of jokes from disapproving parents and authority figures, who were younger then than the band's members are now).

So, what really matters in 2013 is how the Stones sound, not how they look — Jagger's Peter Pan-on-speed stage persona notwithstanding. (The singer is so lean you could see his ribs through his form-fitting T-shirt; his stomach so taught many supermodels might seem a bit paunchy by comparison).

Happily, the Stones sounded consistently inspired on Friday, as they delivered classics, a few obscurities, and two new songs that sounded like vintage songs with a winning combination of passion and precision, authority and abandon.

Rather than coast on their formidable laurels and legendary status, the band performed like it had something to prove, which — in a very real sense — it does.

This, after all, is a tour that created controversy even before it began because of its steep ticket prices. With the best seats priced at $450 to $600, each (plus service charges), and the "cheap" ones (which did sell out) at $150 and $250 each, tickets are still available for every date on what should have been a quickly sold-out tour. The itinerary includes another show at Staples on May 20, and a pair of concerts at the Honda Center on May 15 and 18. (The tour sadly skips San Diego, where — in late 2005 — the Stones became the first band to perform at Petco Park.)

In an effort to give a last-minute boost to the box office, the tour's promoter, AEG Live, this week released 1,000 $85 tickets. More $85 tickets will be released for other dates on the tour, but the mostly steep prices prompted Jagger to make a cheeky comment Friday to a star-studded audience that included Jack Nicholson, Melanie Griffith and Stones' album producer Don Was.

"Good evening, Los Angeles! Or is it really just Beverly Hills, Brentwood and parts of Santa Monica?" Jagger asked, just before he and the band tore into their third song, "It's Only Rock 'N' Roll (But I Like It)."

Jagger later quipped: "The only reason we're here is to make the (Los Angeles) Lakers seem younger!"

On a more serious note, he said: "We first played in Los Angeles in 1965. So, thank you for keeping coming to see us. We really appreciate it."

A fair number of the songs performed Friday dated back to the 1960s, including "Paint It Black," "Jumping Jack Flash," "The Last Time," "Honky Tonk Women," "Factory Girl" and the rollicking "Midnight Rambler," which featured a stinging solo by former Stones' guitarist Mick Taylor and was — at 11 minutes — the longest selection of the night.

For many in the predominantly older audience, it was an opportunity to step back in time and revel in a bygone era, a time when all things seemed possible for the band and for its then equally young audience.

"We grew up with the Stones and we've been a part of that culture for years," said Henrietta Huisking, 63, who flew in for the concert with her husband, Peter, from Arizona after their daughter bought them tickets as a gift.

"It's very nostalgic, being able to revisit that time in our lives when everything was perfect and the world was our oyster."

But what impressed most about the concert was that the Stones consistently injected new life into their classic songs, making them vibrant and fresh musical expressions, not a dusty trip down memory lane or a nostalgic cash-in. The band also threw in some surprises, including the fetching ballad "Factory Girl" and what Jagger told the audience was the group's first-ever life performance of "Emotional Rescue."

An exuberant Richards sang lead on "Before They Make Me Run" and "Happy," the only two songs on which Jagger did not appear on stage. Former Miles Davis and Sting bassist Darryl Jones consistently locked into propulsive grooves with Watts, who managed to make even the hardest rocking songs float and swing.

Where previous Stones tours over the past 25 years have featured an extensive array of backing musicians, this time around only a few key accompanists are on hand. They included former Allman Brothers' keyboardist Chuck Leavell, saxophonists Bobby Keys and Tim Ries, and backing singers Bernard Fowler and Lisa Fisher, who sang with fervor when she and Jagger traded vocals on "Gimme Shelter."

Whether or not this tour marks the final extended concert trek by the Stones remains to be seen, but it is their shortest in decades (unless several more legs are added). Either way, Jagger seemed to take great relish when he performed Friday's second selection, adding inflections to key words in the line: "This may be the last time, I don't know."

If it is, the band is going out with a big bang that is tarnished only by the tour's inflated ticket prices. If another tour follows, well, time may just be on the Rolling Stones' side for a few more years to come after all.

Rolling Stones set list, May 3, 2013, Staples Center, Los Angeles

"Get Off of My Cloud"

"The Last Time"

"It's Only Rock 'n Roll (But I Like It)"

"Paint It, Black"

"Gimme Shelter"

"Wild Horses" (with Gwen Stefani on vocals)

"Factory Girl"

"Emotional Rescue"

"Respectable" (with Keith Urban on guitar and vocals)

"Doom and Gloom"

"One More Shot"

"Honky Tonk Women"

"Before They Make Me Run"

"Happy"

"Midnight Rambler" (with Mick Taylor on guitar)

"Miss You"

"Start Me Up"

"Tumbling Dice"

"Brown Sugar"

"Sympathy for the Devil"

Encores

"You Can't Always Get What You Want" (with the Cal State Long Beach choir)